


Paris Cab Drivers Truly Are A Race Of Their Own

by WhenIFindLoveAgain



Series: A Bag Of Bash For Passion [18]
Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Affairs, Alternate Universe - Paris, Angst and Humor, British Comedy, Chaos, Cheating, Comedy, Dark Comedy, Europe, F/M, Fluff and Humor, France (Country), Holidays, Hospitalization, Hospitals, Humor, Implied/Referenced Cheating, M/M, Paris (City), Protests, Romantic Comedy, Sexual Humor, Travel, Travelogue, World Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-11
Updated: 2020-08-11
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:41:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25836646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhenIFindLoveAgain/pseuds/WhenIFindLoveAgain
Summary: The beginning of Minghao's eventful holiday in Paris before he returns to South Korea; it involves cheating, hospitalization, pub crawls, breaking down Peugeots, wild house parties, nudie runs, "jazz pornography", high fashion exploits, and, merry chaos insues. Read "SO COME AND SET THE MOOD RIGHT UNDERNEATH THE MOONLIGHT" before or after
Relationships: Kim Mingyu/Xu Ming Hao | The8, Wen Jun Hui | Jun/Xu Ming Hao | The8, Xu Ming Hao | The8/Original Character(s), Xu Ming Hao | The8/Original Female Character(s), Xu Ming Hao | The8/Original Male Character(s)
Series: A Bag Of Bash For Passion [18]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1678627
Kudos: 1





	Paris Cab Drivers Truly Are A Race Of Their Own

Paris had been gorgeous. They were there for a month, and, now, two weeks in, Minghao wasn't sure if he wanted to leave. Everywhere he looked, everywhere he went, the aura was different. They were just a different race of people, they were a different kind altogther; their behaviour, their mannerisms, their perception, the way they moved, their beliefs, their history, even the dark side to their little world was a different kind altogether. Minghao loved Paris, and, he thought Paris didn't mind him especially when he wasn't like all the other tourists in their breton-stripe tops, bicycles, berets, roses, tippex moustaches, and drinking wine until they were sozzled at every meal when they came to Paris. 

"Darling." Minghao woke up with his girlfriend Gigi moving over the top of him a little bit from where he lay on his side in the bed in the apartment that she and he were renting for the on-month stay. She kissed his shoulder and then his neck and then his head just above his ear, murmuring to him all the while in French.

Gigi was French, and, Minghao had met her in South Korea when he had been out with one of his mates, Junhui, who had been walking his pet - and decidedly very huge - leonberger when they had seen Gigi on a cycle path up ahead. But, the day had been a chilly day, and, the wheels of her bicycle and lost traction with the pavement, and, she had crashed head-first into a tree. Minghao and Junhui had rushed to help her, and, they soon had found that underneath her helmet - and some twigs - was a gorgeous thick-boned round face with full lips, hooded eyes, a beehive of dark brown hair and gorgeous thick eyebrows on a models body. Her full name was Gigi Guillame, and, she was a exchange student to South Korea, studying anthropology. 

"Brains, looks, good skin, long legs, nice eyes - you greedy bastard." Junhui had told Minghao once with a laugh. 

Junhui wasn't jealous of Gigi, though, he was likely expected to be if the wider world knew what was going on with himself and Minghao.

For the past three or four years, Junhui and Minghao had had a casual sex agreement going on.

Gigi didn't know about it. She didn't know about any of it.

"Hao-ah..." She whispered in his ear, coaxing him out of sleep though he was already awake.

"Hm?" He hummed softly, turning over to face her.

Whoever it was who first said that French women were good in bed, it hadn't been a product of sexism, or crude, sexual and damaging and degrading sense of the French woman as a human being.

It was a product of total fucking honesty.

Minghao had never been given a hickey by a girl before...

Until he met Gigi.

Minghao couldn't stop smiling happily to himself as he drove along in the rented Purgeot in a Gigi had collected from the airport. She wanted to have some time to herself with her cousins and sisters - absolutely no problem - and, in the mean time, Paris was full of things to entertain himself with. Minghao turned on the radio ad he nearly burst out laughing to hear "Mamma Mia" by ABBA playing on the radio.

Who knew they had ABBA in France?

ABBA in English, for the matter?

Minghao frowned slightly as the car began to make a strange, declingingly whirring sound. Oh. That wasn't good. Minghao looked up over the bonnet of the car, and, his eyes widened at the sight of smoke rising up in the air.

Oh, shit. 

That was stupid of him, wasn't it?

For the past week, protests about worker's rights, conditions, pay and hours in the transport sector had been going on. It had been all over the internet and the television and the newspapers.

And what the fuck had he just done?

Directly drive into it.

Minghao judged that the sight in the sky was part smoke from a hu-huge! bonfire some protestors had set up in the middle of the main connecting side avenue to the Arc D'Triumph, and, also, some wasn't smoke at all.

It was fucking tear gas. 

Minghao pulled up to the side of the cobblestoned street and rested his forehead on his hands on the steering wheel for a few moments before climbing out to check the engine. He couldn't see anything wrong. The radiator was in good condition, so was the cooling system.

Minghao got back into the Pugeot, and, as he went to start it, it wouldn't start. The engine turned over several times, and, Minghao tried and tried and tried again for some minutes.

He swore.

The car was fucked.

And he was in a very bad position.

Minghao's eyes caught the sight of a wheel - on fire no less! - rolling down the street and the window of someone's home on the second level was smashed, showering the crowd wearing black gloves, hoodies, trousers, woolen hats and high-visibility vests below with glass, as someone threw what appeared to be a lump of rock pulled fro the cobblestoned road through it. 

Minghao needed to do two things very fast; call a tow truck for the car, but, he wasn't sure if one could come admist all this, and, he didn't know the recovery service number for Paris, and, his French was barely good enough even though he practiced it for an hour every night before he went to sleep. He also needed to get out of the area, very, very, very fast.

But, low and behold, his phone was fucking flat.

"Oh, Jesus Christ..." Minghao said under his breath. There was no other option. He'd have to find a telephone box.

And...yes. There was one down the bottom of the avenue. 

Minghao climbed cautiously out of the car and pulled his black wool coat tighter around his skinny frame. It was the middle of Winter in Paris, and, Minghao would be going back to Korea by himself while Gigi stayed with her family in Paris. Minghao didn't mind, no, the thought made him smile. He couldn't meet them only a few weeks before and stay for Christmas - he couldn't do so anyway, he needed to go back to Korea. Minghao was briefly imagining Gigi running around in her jeans and one of her mixed-wool Chanel jackets with the fringed hem on the back, front and the sleeves when everything happened.

"Sh...!" Minghao crashed to the ground on his hands and knees, utterly winded of any oxygen, his head just having hit the ground along with his body, cold, slippery, icy-covered parisian cobble-stoned pavement beneath his body. Paint, sharp and blinding and so, so concious, burst through his body and his senses and into his brain, splitting it up like a walnut halved. Oh. Oh God.

"Agh!" Minghao cried out. Everywhere, left, right, and centre, people with knives, sporting bats, placards baring anti-goverment and protest slogans and sayings, and protestors in general rang and roared and swarmed around him on the ground, nearly trampling him, as though he didn't exist at all. Minghao yelled at them to stop, trying to get up but keep getting knocked down. He was in too much pain to deal with all of this right now.

Minghao went to get up onto his hands and knees, but, his left side gave out entirely. Something was very, very wrong. He couldn't breathe properly, and, this excruciating pain filled up his chest, back and head. He couldn't focus, and he couldn't see -

A woman screamed in the distance, before, earth-shattering hit came to the back of Minghao's head knocking him back down to the ground and making his vision go pitch black. 

Barely seconds later, Minghao could feel the hot trickle of his own blood at the back of his head and neck, turning cold at immediate exposure in the Parisian winter air. Minghao couldn't help it. He began to lose it, tears leaking out of his eyes, and, no one in the world coming to help him. He couldn't move, and, he couldn't breathe 

"Get out of the way! Get out of the way! Move! Pigs! Fucking move, you syphilitic scum!"

Minghao began to shake uncontrollably, laying on the ground. He wondered fearfully, with all the boots and feet of people rushing about him, if they would just truly crush him. He couldn't move, could barely think, but, pain filled up his body, and, so did anger. He had come to Paris for a holiday; spending time with Gigi in her home country, meeting her family, been amongst her friends and the little world she had created for herself in this little European country. Just been human, having fun, been young.

And he felt like someone else was going to cause his death by seeing him as if he didn't exist, laying on the cobblestoned footpath bleeding and in agony on the Arc D'Triumph connecting avenues.

"Boy? Boy?" Warm hands touched his shoulders and back and his neck, checking his pulse. The voice spoke in heavily accented English. "I take you to the Doctor, yeah? I am Jean Agnew, I have a cab, let me help you, you are quite, quite sick, boy."

Minghao gasped and screamed as the man turned him over onto his back. The man started speaking in French again before he went back to English. "Oh, Jesus, what has happened to you, boy, oh, no. Come with me, trust me, please, boy." Minghao's eyes opened a little bit, and, even though his sight was foggy and out-of-focus, the man holding him was tall and strong with...he didn't seem old. Only a little bit older than him.

Dark blonde hair...

Green...green grey eyes...

Minghao screamed again, and, to his fear, started to choke as he was laid down in the back of a big car, what seemed to be a big car. The man started speaking in French again, and, rubbed the side of his hip soothingly.

"I take you to Doctor, please, Doctor here soon." Minghao felt something thick and soft been put underneath his head, and, a seat-belt secured the wrong way around his body sideways in the back seats of the vehicle. Minghao began to shiver uncontrollably again as the vehicle took off from the curb, and, the shouts of Frenchmen yelling vicious abuse and the honking or so many horns - all the horns in the world - filled up the air and tortured Minghao's severely injured body.

Minghao passed out.

When he woke up again, white light surrounded him and the beeping of machines and the quite chatter of respective people. He was aware that he was in a man's arms, and, the man appeared to be telling off a nurse at the triage centre. 

"I don't care you stupid bitch!" The man yelled. "He's bleeding everywhere, he's in so much pain, it doesn't matter I don't know him, his name, where he is from, what language he speaks, whether he has travel or health insurance, he needs a Doctor! Fucking get me one, you useless whore!"

The next thing Minghao knew, he was been laid down in a bed, and, that was all for the next few hours. When he next woke up, a man - perhaps on closer inspection about thirty-five - was sitting in a chair beside his bed in a ward with a folded newspaper, a empty sanwhich container, and a take-away coffee on a little table beside Minghao's bed. The man was quirkily handsome in a Anglo way with features that still made him very appealing but not pretty-boy. Minghao came to figure it out; Gigi's Mum watched a British murder show, based around a Catholic parish or something like that. This cab-driver looked a bit like the guy from that show...James Norton. Minghao was concious of the fact he now had a oxygen mask on his face, a IV drip in the crook of his elbow, a heartbeat clamp on his index finger, and, a bung in the back of each wrist.

"Thank you." Minghao shifted the oxyegn mask on his face to talk to the man. "Merci bien."

The man smiled. Oh. He was lovely when he smiled.

"I want to make sure you are ok." He said. Minghao thought he sounded wonderful when he spoke. "You were in a bad, bad way."

"I don't even know what happened." Minghao confessed. 

"You got hit by a flying stone. A..brick?" The man searched for the words, and gestured to Minghao's head by gesturing to his own. "And, your - well, here -" The man gestured to his chest. "Rubber bullet by the anti-riot squad. Policemen."

"You're kidding." Minghao's eyes widened. 

"No way." Jean shook his head.

They both laughed.

"What's your name?" Minghao asked. Looking back on it now, he was so grateful to one of his mates, Joshua, for teaching him English, having been raised up as a child in America.

"Jean." The cab-driver reached out to shake Minghao's hand, but, it was a bit hard for Minghao to move with been connected up to seven different machines, so, Jean just patted his stomach. Minghao grinned.

"You?" Jean quipped.

"Minghao." Minghao answered.

"China?" Jean checked.

"Yeah, that's it." Minghao nodded.

"I didn't think you were...Japan, yeah? Other people say so." Jean gestured to a nurse that went past on her rounds.

"Idiots." Minghao rolled his eyes. Jean chuckled. "If I'm Japanese then you're German."

They both laughed again. "How long have I been in here?" Minghao asked.

"Seven hours you are the asleep." Jean confirmed.

"You've been here all this time?" Minghao quipped incredulously.

"Yeah. Oh, for food, but, yes." Jean gestured to the coffee cup and the sandwhich container.

"You're a really, really kind man." Minghao told him.

Jean shrugged, but, his eyes twinkled. His mouth turn upwardly and crookedly. "You are a very, very sick man. I want to stay with you."

Minghao smiled. "Do you have a family?"

Jean shook his head. "My wife go away not long ago."

"I'm sorry." Minghao meant it.

"Oh, it's fine." Jean smiled. "She find a Jew to love. What about you?"

"Not yet." Minghao said. "But one day. What is your job?"

"Duex jobs." Jean held up two fingers. Minghao watched him. Part of him liked Jean, watching the way he spoke and the way he moved. It was the same part of him that had him craving Junhui's skin and his high and his mouth every lonely weekend or halfway through the week itself when he got desperate, as he always did. "I drive cab from Monday to Friday, and, then, on weekend, I drive as a chauffer for the politicians."

"Wow, that's really cool." Minghao said. "Are these the politicians getting their houses set on fire?"

Jean laughed, and shook his head. "I drive Minister for Racing Horses and Sport." He said. "Sometimes the President. I'm the youngest Government driver since the 1800's. What is your occupation?" He asked Minghao.

"I make films." Minghao said simply. Something lit up in Jean's eyes.

"This is great." He said. "French people like the cinema. We are corrupted as children and we are this way for all of our life."

They laughed again. "When can I go home?" Minghao asked.

"You stay here this night." Jean said. "But, next day, you can go."

"Do you want to go home?" Minghao put to Jean. "You don't have to stay."

"Oui, I do stay." Jean said. "You speak the language but not all of it, none of these dumb nurses know English like they should and you can't be here alone."

"Could you do a favour for me?" Minghao asked.

"Uh...help you?" Jean checked his English. Minghao nodded.

"Yes, sorry." Minghao smiled. "My girlfriend - my woman - she's at home. She doesn't know what has happened."

"Oh, yes, fuck, this is bad." Jean pulled his phone out of his pocket, and, Minghao appreciated the fact that Jean was here. He truly, truly did. "Numbers?"

Minghao gave them out to Jean, and, Jean held his phone by Minghao's ear. The engaged tone rang, and, then, it rang out.

"Maybe she in the bathroom or she is - you know, the cook." Jean said when Minghao's expression fell. "Happens with the girls. Your woman, is she China too?"

"She's French like you." Minghao answered.

"I ring again and leave message. I hate the dumb people who ring up trying to sell you things and do scams. Because they always do this, right, if a foreign numbers come up - like here, like now - there is no trust. Bastards."

Minghao chuckled softly. Jean rang again and left a message. 

"Tell her which hospital this is so she might come, hey?" Jean remarked to Minghao. 

"That would be nice."

"She pretty?"

Minghao smiled again. He was doing a lot of that this evening. "Face straight out of a magazine." He replied.

"Fuck, this is so perfect for you." Jean grinned. "You hungry, man? There is a McDonald's down the street -" He gestured. "Hospital food - even pigs would say "Excuses moi, non, merci". Or, their is Chinese shop if you want rice?"

"Did I have my wallet stolen?" Minghao asked Jean.

"Ah..." Jean went across the other side to Minghao's curtained off section of the ward and checked his jeans. "I think so, yes, sorry, man."

"No, no, in my coat." Minghao said. Jean hummed and checked there. He grinned and pulled out Minghao's wallet. Jean realized what Minghao meant by it.

"No, no, I can pay my own money -" Jean said.

"No, please, do it with mine." Minghao pointed to his wallet. "You like Chinese food?" Jean nodded. "Get yourself something too. The nurses can hate us later."

Jean grinned. "Your girl must want to get married very, very fast."

Minghao blushed. Jean just laughed.

While Jean flew across the bed and punched the guy Gigi had just been bouncing up and down on, Gigi stumbled across the room to Minghao.

"My darling, I -" She went to take his hand but Minghao pulled it out of her reach. His lip curled at the sight of cum and pre-come and spit shining on her stomach, her breasts, her neck, and the insides of her thighs. He watched a drip from her vagina come down onto the floor and, he hated her. He just absolutely hated her. And, yet, the irony was, how beautiful Gigi was with her sixties style make-up smudged around her eyes and her dark beehive hair still mostly in it's half-up half-down style even though her other lover's hands had torn and gripped their way through it.

"You fucking typical Euro-trash bitch." Minghao glared at her. "Your filthy fucking race was trampling me as I lay unconcious and bleeding on the ground because I had a brick thrown at me head and I got shot at by your Police."

Tears spilled down out of Gigi's eyes and down her cheeks, but, Minghao couldn't give a fuck. He looked over to where Jean was still smacking the other lover about.

"And that very nice man - the only man in this country who came to help me - has been with me in hospital all night while I had my head stitched up and my ribs and collarbones fixed, because, everything was broken." Minghao breathed heavily. "I don't want to see you again. You're just a fucking liar."

Minghao left the room and, Jean came out soon after me, but Gigi latched onto his arm, and, begged Jean in French to talk to Minghao.

"Get off, bitch." Jean shoved her off to the ground, and, then, closed the apartment door behind him gently. He came over to Minghao and put an arm around him.

"It's just clothes in there, right?" he asked Minghao of his belongings. Minghao nodded.

"Leave them - oh, no, your papers. You need your papers otherwise you go to prison." Jean set Minghao in one spot, and, slammed the apartment door open. Only a minute or so later he came out with a suitcase straining at the seams, Gigi screaming, and, strangely, a eery silence from the other love. The suitcase was Minghao's suitcase.

"That's how you pack a bag." Jean commented. He kept his hand at the small of Minghao's back and led him out of the apartment building and down to his cab. He took off the "carrying passengers" sign in the front windscreen and back windscreen, putting Minghao's case in the boot and told Minghao to get into the passenger seat.

Minghao couldn't think clearly, couldn't quite feel, but, all the while, the entire world spun around on an upset axis inside of him. He looked out of the window at the passing city around them, and, noticed after a while that they were getting into a very, very posh part of Paris, right near the Eiffel Tower. Jean had taken them back to what seemed to be was his house. 

Jean's house was absolutely gorgeous. It was a early 19th Century light-latte carved-stone masterpiece at three stories high with exposed roof-top area, with the architectural characteristics of the lead roof with the old cast iron guards on the top-most arch of the roof. Jean's home was built on a corner block and each level had arch-shaped doorways that looked out over the city, and, on the third and second levels were balconies, and, above the front door on the first level was a half-moon shaped awning like most of the little shops had. It was dark red and white striped, and, the sight of it and it's aesthetic made Minghao warm inside. Jean took him inside and up the stairs to the second level. The whole home was incredible with sixteen-foot ceilings, original wallpaper, decorative skirting and cornices, polished cedar floorboards, old-world furniture - some genuine antiques and some not quite so old - and, it was clean and fresh and every smelt...nice. Just nice. 

Jean got Minghao into a sitting room on the second floor, and, Minghao sat on a chaise-lounge against east-facing wall in the not quite triangular-shaped room. Either side of him were huge, multipaned windows that looked out onto the city and the Eiffel tower. 

Jean must get a lot of money been a Government driver, Minghao thought, but, he wondered if Jean's family had had a lot of money also.

Jean bought in a bottle of whiskey and two coffee mugs.

"You might feel this a bit more, you lost a bit of blood the last day." Jean said. Minghao nodded gratefully and murmured a thank you as Jean poured him a comfortable amount into the mug. They clinked the mugs together in a irreverent sort of toast before necking the first mouthful. 

"I'm so sorry."

"Thank you so much for hitting that guy."

"Is ok, you lost blood the last day, you are still not strong."

"I'm not that strong anyway. Have trouble moving the furniture around."

Jean chuckled. 

"Always need my mates to come and help me." Minghao took another mouthful of alcohol.

"How much longer do you have here?" Jean asked.

"Just over two weeks."

"You can stay here. The hotels - even bad ones - leave you with no money, very expensive."

"If it's ok for me to be here I'm giving you some money."

"No, no, no." Jean shook his head. "You don't pay me any money; just don't make a mess or fall down the stairs and die."

Minghao gazed at Jean. 

"You are in a foreign country, and many people would not care because you are from China." Jean added. "I don't like to say it but French people are prejudiced; lot of it around. Don't want you getting hurt or robbed or taken avantage of by some pig."

Minghao drank some more of the whiskey. "Are you sure you don't want money?" He asked.

"No money. Just be clean and don't fall down the stairs or - actually no falling off the balcony." Jean pointed outside. "People should never have bad time in Paris, but, you have, and that's no good, man."

"Thank you." Minghao said. Jean nodded. "What about your job?" He asked.

"Oh, doing the cab driving throughout the week - I'm my own boss." Jean smiled. "I get by fine doing the weekend politics driving but, I wouldn't really have anything else to do throughout the rest of the week, would I? What did you have planned for the rest of your holiday?"

Minghao shrugged. "Try and have some fun, I guess?"

It was the best plan.


End file.
